One of the three men who were hospitalized Aug. 7 after a cigarette ignited paint fumes and caused an explosion in the van they were riding in by West Valley Medical Center in Caldwell has died, according to Idaho State Police reports.

ISP officials say 58-year-old Jose L. Gonzalez of Greenleaf died early Thursday. He had been hospitalized in Salt Lake City since the crash.

Investigators say the explosion occurred right after 30-year-old Roman Gonzalez, who was driving a grey GMC Savana van with two passengers inside and filled with paint and chemicals, lit a cigarette and then dropped it on the floor, according to Caldwell Fire and ISP reports.

The crew had just left a painting job in Caldwell before 6:30 p.m. and Gonzalez was driving the van westbound on West Logan Street when he dropped the lit cigarette, which ignited paint and chemical vapors and caused a fireball in the van, according to reports.

Roman Gonzalez and front seat passenger, 50-year-old Ramon Gonzalez, jumped out of the van while it was still in motion.

Two homemade bombs exploded in a residential neighborhood north of Prineville Tuesday night, and a third was disabled by bomb technicians from the Oregon State Police, authorities said.

Crook County Sheriff's deputies responded to McDougal Court at around 10:22 p.m., when a resident reported that an unknown device had exploded in the driveway.

Deputies found evidence of a second explosion shortly after arriving in the area, as well as a third, unexploded device nearby.

Sgt. James Savage said the devices are similar to dry-ice bombs, but more powerful. Made with household items in beverage bottles, the pressure inside the bottle slowly builds up as a result of a chemical reaction between the ingredients, and the bottle eventually explodes.

"It's pretty violent. It would probably blow your hand off if you had it in your hand when it went off," Savage said.

Savage said an OSP bomb squad investigating a recent incident in Gilchrist was able to respond quickly to Crook County and disarm the unexploded device.

Update: An earlier version of this story referred to a fire in a trash compactor, based on reports from fire department and 911 dispatch center officials. Fire department spokeswoman Bernadette Galvez now says there was never an actual fire in the trash compactor, just a chemical reaction that looked like a fire.

A chemical reaction in a trash compactor that was mistaken for a fire outside the Concourse Hotel attracted a hazardous materials team Thursday morning, officials said.

The container was smoking, giving the appearance of a fire, Galvez said, but an investigation revealed the incident was actually a chemical reaction and the container was never on fire.

Fire fighters reported a strong ammonia smell and called a hazardous materials crew as a precaution, according to Galvez.

She said part of North Carroll Street behind the hotel was closed off, but has since been re-opened.

There have been a number of fires in trash containers around Madison recently, at least one of which Madison police said was suspicious. Galvez said this incident was under investigation, but is not considered suspicious.

A spill of a chemical used in hot chili sauce and pepper spray forced more than 100 FedEx workers to evacuate a freight area early today, the Memphis Commercial Appeal reports.

A forklift punctured a 5-gallon barrel of liquid capsaicin about 2:30 a.m. outside a building at the parcel carrier's global hub in Memphis. FedEx spokesman Chris Stanley said the chemical was going to be used to make hot sauce, adding, "Basically, it was the hot in hot sauce."

The fire department reported 117 workers were exposed, at least 10 complained of chest pains or trouble breathing, and two went to the hospital as a precaution.

The brief shutdown, less than an hour, did not affect FedEx's system, Stanley said.

A day after a huge fire gutted a major part of Bharath Inc chemical factory in Jeedimetla, it has come to light that the company had not obtained the required licences from the department of factories and Pollution Control Board.
Officials of the factories department visited the company premises on Thursday along with the local police who are investigating the cause of the mishap.

A truck spilled some type of material along a section of the Sam Houston Tollway in east Harris County, causing a traffic shutdown in the area.

Houston TranStar officials said a single truck was responsible for the spill that happened about 9:15 p.m. Wednesday along a section of the East Sam Houston Tollway near Jacinto Port Boulevard.

TranStar officials called the substance a "corrosive liquid chemical" and said people in the area were reporting burning eyes and throats. They asked any motorists to avoid the area until further notice.

Authorities closed down both north and southbound lanes of the tollway at the scene for the cleanup effort. It wasn't clear how long that would take and whether it would be completed in time for Thursday morning commuters.

Fire in an ink making factory at Jeedimetla on Tuesday damaged four adjacent buildings extensively while crores of rupees worth property was destroyed even as firemen struggled for nearly 10 hours to control the blaze.

Fortunately, no one was injured in the fire mishap which started at 9 a.m.

It created panic among locals and workers of surrounding factories as drums of chemical solvents blew up one after the other. As the area was filled with thick clouds of smoke, the firemen brought from six fire service stations struggled to control the blaze.

Explosion of a container at a steam core iron factory in Shadnagar claimed three lives and critically injured 10 on Wednesday even as fire-fighters battled another major fire in a chemical godown in Jeedimetla. The latter incident did not entail loss of lives but gutted property worth several crores.
The blast in the liquid iron container in Shadnagar happened around 9 a.m. during the first shift on Wednesday morning when about 20 workers were present there. The container burst and splattered liquid iron across the room, causing severe burns to the workers. All the three victims were aged between 25 and 35 and hailed from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
The injured were immediately shifted to a local hospital and then to private hospitals in Hyderabad. Three of them - Deep Lal, Kapil Khanna and Malkan Singh - succumbed to injuries while being shifted to Hyderabad. The trio, along with five others, were said to be standing close to the container when it exploded.

A violent chemical reaction forced three people to evacuate a business in Pittsfield Township early Wednesday morning.

Pittsfield Township firefighters responded to a report of smoke coming from Pacific Industrial Development, 4788 Runway Blvd., at 12:13 a.m. Wednesday. Upon arrival, firefighters quickly found the smoke was actually an acidic vapor caused by the mixture of two chemicals, neodymium oxide and nitric acid.

The Washtenaw County Hazardous Materials Response Team was called and, using chemical protective equipment, cooled the 100-gallon container with about 35 gallons of the solution inside to the point where the reaction stopped.

One of the three employees at the business, which makes specialty chemicals and nanomaterials used in pollution and emissions-control devices, was exposed to the vapor but was wearing chemical protective clothing and a respirator, escaping injury, firefighters said in a press release.

There will be no lasting effects to the environment or area around the building, Pittsfield Township Fire Chief Sean Gleason said Wednesday morning.

Workers were making the solution as a part of a research project, said Bill Germond, vice president of PIDC. The amount of nitric acid released was very small, even though it appeared along with a large cloud of steam, he said.

Researchers had previously made a small amount of the solution in laboratories, but when it was made in the larger tank, the reaction was bigger than expected, Germond said. It was the first time the company has needed the hazmat team's assistance with a reaction.

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